Posts Tagged ‘science’

A decade ago, scientists announced that they had produced the first draft of the human genome, the 3.6 billion letters of our genetic code.

It was seen as one of the greatest scientific achievements of our age, a breakthrough that would usher in a new age of medicine. A decade later, Horizon finds out how close we are to developing the life-changing treatments that were hoped for.

Horizon follows three people, each with a genetic disease, as they go behind the scenes at some of Britain’s leading research labs to find out what the sequencing of the human genome has done for them – and the hope this remarkable project offers all of us.

The Cassiopeia Project is an effort to make high quality science videos available to everyone. If you can visualize it, then understanding is not far behind.

Code for Life: Beginning more than three and a half billion years ago, a tiny, primitive molecule encoded instructions deep within itself. Then it passed these instructions on to its children, who passed it to their children and so on – all the way down through time to all living things today.

The human genome, written in a code of just four letters, tells us who we really are – and that generates many questions!

Is this process of natural selection coming to an end? Should we choose the best that is in us for our children? If so, who gets to decide what is meant by “the best that is in us”?

Report says ‘human augmentation’ is likely to increase over next 30 years

Details released following a Freedom of Information request

A generation of genetically-modified ‘X-Men’ superhumans could be among us by 2045, a Ministry of Defence think tank has said.Advancements in gene technology could help humans gain mutant powers such as the likes of Wolverine, Cyclops and Storm in the popular comic book and movie series, it has been reported.

The MoD’s Development Concepts and Doctrine Centre warn however that ‘genetic inequality’ could result from advancements in biology being unequally shared across society.

Mutant: MoD experts have suggested a generation of genetically-modified ‘X-Men’ superhumans, such as Wolverine, could be a reality by 2045

The centre met last summer for a two-day summit, featuring experts from government, industry and universities. The details have been released following a Freedom of Information request by The Sun.

It was reported during the summit, held to predict what would happen in the future, that: ‘Advancements in gene technology could lead to a class of genetically superior humans by 2045.

‘Human augmentation is likely to increase over the next 30 years.

‘Discussions highlighted that it is possible that advances in biology, unequally shared across society, could generate genetic inequality.’

The X-Men are a team of mutant superheroes created by writer Stan Lee and artist Jack Kirby, who first appeared in Marvel Comics in 1963.

The mutants use their powers for the benefit of humanity, despite an ever-growing anti-mutant sentiment among mankind.

The comics were turned into a highly-successful film series, featuring Hugh Jackman as Wolverine, Halle Berry as Storm, Ian McKellan as Magneto and Patrick Stewart as Professor X.

A genetic researcher is saying that Bigfoot DNA assessments establish that the furry creature actually does exist. Dr. Melba S. Ketchum states she and her staff sequenced about three complete Sasquatch nuclear genomes and concluded the species is a human hybrid — a mosaic of human and novel non-human aspects. Their conclusions have still to go peer evaluation.

A Texas veterinarian says she and fellow genetic scientists have verified the existence of “Bigfoot,”even however their findings have even so to pass peer overview.

Dr. Melba S. Ketchum of Nacogdoches, founder of DNA Diagnostics Inc. in the eastern Texas town of Timpson, said she and her crew expended 5 several years on their research of purported Bigfoot hair and determined they have validated the existence of a hominin hybrid Pertinent Answers/Firms species, the famous creature frequently acknowledged as “Bigfoot” or “Sasquatch,” residing in North The usa.

There have been recurrent-but-unsubstantiated claims of Bigfoot sightings additional than the a long time, which include some grainy film clips.

In a release posted on the company’s Web internet site Saturday, the scientists say their DNA sequencing suggests the animal is a human relative that created about 15,000 several years back as a hybrid cross of present day Homo sapiens with an not known primate species.

Ketchum mentioned her team has sequenced three whole Sasquatch nuclear genomes and concluded the species is a human hybrid.

“Our examine has sequenced 20 comprehensive mitochondrial genomes and utilized up coming generation sequencing to obtain a few whole nuclear genomes from purported Sasquatch samples,” she claimed in the release. “The genome sequencing shows that Sasquatch mtDNA is identical to present day working day Homo sapiens, but Sasquatch nuDNA is a novel, mysterious hominin suitable to Homo sapiens and other primate species.

“Our facts Associated Items/Firms point out that the North American Sasquatch is a hybrid species, the final result of males of an unknown hominin species crossing with female Homo sapiens.”

Genetic testing has by now dominated out Homo neanderthalis and the Denisova hominin as contributors to Sasquatch mtDNA or nuDNA, she talked about.

“The male progenitor that contributed the not known sequence to this hybrid is special as its DNA is additional distantly removed from humans than other these days identified hominins like the Denisovan particular person,” Ketchum said.

“Sasquatch nuclear DNA is extremely novel and not at all what we experienced anticipated. Even although it has human nuclear DNA inside its genome, there are also distinctly non-human, non-archaic hominin, and non-ape sequences. We identify it as a mosaic of human and novel non-human sequence.”

She mentioned even far more take a look at is vital to “outstanding characterize and have an understanding of Sasquatch nuclear DNA.”

Ketchum, who describes herself as a veterinarian with 27 numerous a long time realistic experience in genetics investigation, which include forensics, needs general public officers and law enforcement to realize the Sasquatch as an indigenous folks today.

“Genetically, the Sasquatch are a human hybrid with unambiguously modern-day-day human maternal ancestry,” she mentioned. “Government at all quantities have to understand them as an indigenous men and women today and right absent guard their human and constitutional rights in the direction of men and women who would see in their bodily and cultural distinctions a ‘license’ to hunt, entice or get rid of them.”

Folks residing outside the house Africa discuss as significantly as several for each cent of their DNA with Neanderthals, a cave-dwelling species with muscular small arms and legs and a mind marginally larger than ours.

The Cambridge scientists examined demographic styles suggesting that human beings were far from intimate with the species they displaced in Europe nearly forty,000 many years in the past.

The research into the genomes of the two species, located a frequent ancestor five hundred,000 many years in the past would be adequate to account for the shared DNA.

Their assessment, revealed in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS), contradicts latest reports that discovered inter-species mating, identified as hybridisation, almost certainly transpired.

Dr Andrea Manica, who led the review, said: “To me the interbreeding question is not whether there was hybridisation but whether there was any hybridisation that afflicted the subsequent evolution of individuals. I assume this is really, quite not likely.

“Our work shows clearly the patterns presently witnessed in the Neanderthal genome are not outstanding, and are in line with our expectations of what we would see with no hybridisation.

“So, if any hybridisation happened then it would have been minimum and considerably less than what individuals are proclaiming now.”

Data has shown that Neanderthals ended up pushed into extinction by humans who have been a lot more efficient at obtaining food and multiplied at a more quickly fee.

A prior review in 2010 suggested that interspecies liaisons near the Middle East resulted in Neanderthal genes initial moving into humans 70,000 a long time in the past.

Contemporary non-Africans reveal more with Neanderthals than Africans, supporting the claim that the mixing happened when the initial earlier humans remaining Africa to populate Europe and Asia.

The existence of a five hundred,000-12 months-old shared ancestor that predates the source of Neanderthals gives a greater rationalization for the genetic mix.

Variety inside this ancestral species intended that northern Africans have been far more genetically similar to their European counterparts than southern Africans through geographic proximity.

This likeness persisted above time to account for the overlap with the Neanderthal genome we see in modern people these days.

Variations in between populations can be described by prevalent ancestry, Dr Manica said.

“The notion is that our African ancestors would not have been a homogeneous, effectively-mixed populace but manufactured of a number of populations in Africa with some degree of differentiation, in the way proper now you can explain to a northern and southern European from their appears,” she mentioned.

âBased on common ancestry and geographic differences amid populations inside of every single continent, we would forecast out of Africa populations to be far more comparable to Neanderthals than their African counterparts â just the patterns that ended up observed when the Neanderthal genome was sequenced, but this routine was attributed to hybridisation.

“Ideally, every person will turn out to be far more careful just before invoking hybridisation, and start off having into account that historic populations differed from every other almost certainly as significantly as present day populations do.â

Northern Africans would be far more comparable to Europeans and ancient similarity stayed due to the fact there wasn’t ample mixing among northern and southern Africans.

Populace diversity, known as substructure, cant make clear info on the shared genes, mentioned David Reich, a professor of genetics at Harvard Health-related College, in Boston who authored the 2010 examine.

We have ruled out the chance that historical substructure can make clear all the proof of higher relatedness of Neanderthals to non-Africans than to Africans, he extra.

Dr Manica stated hybridisation among Neanderthals and people can never ever be disproved completely.